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A bit of good economic news this week as the Department of Labor says new initial unemployment claims last week dropped by 36,000 from the week before, down to 383,000 claims. It still needs to drop lower — and it has to be offset even more by positive job gains — to make a serious dent in the unemployment rate for the right reasons, but the lower the number of initial jobless claims is the easier it is to offset those losses. The report says there are a total of 9,405,527 people in the United States receiving unemployment insurance, but that number is only about half of the total number of people who are actually unemployed

New statement from the Senate GOP leader. As foreshadowed by last week’s letter to Attorney General Eric Holder from nine Republican senators, McConnell argues

If you just started watching Sonia Sotomayor’s confirmation hearing during the statement of Sen. Tom Coburn (R-Okla.), you might think you’d stumbled on a

Here is the latest from Ana Marie Cox, our newest correspondent, reporting from the campaign trail with Sen. John McCain in Bowling Green, Ohio.

Just hours before the Senate is due to vote on a non-binding directive to its committee conferees on exempting loan-issuing car dealers from financial

Our recent post on a new poll indicating that more that 52 percent of the country is opposed to allowing the open carry of loaded guns in public has left some

<p>The American Family Association is giving us <a id="pep1" href="http://www.afa.net/pb2008b/index.html" title="a rare

The Christian Science Monitor’s Ben Quinn sheds some light on the legality of Israel’s recent and deadly attack on an aid flotilla making its way to Gaza. Quinn

ANCHORAGE -- Wow, here’s a great catch over at TPMmuckraker. It turns out that Steven Silver, the lobbyist Alaska Gov. Sarah Palin hired to hustle federal

First appeared September 25, 2008 Forty years ago, in September 1968, the North Vietnamese launched the Tet offensive — which changed mainstream

All four Public Regulation Commissioners signed a statement urging Commissioner Jerome Block, Jr., to resign his seat Tuesday; Block was not present at the proceedings. “Given the allegations and recent evidence that has surfaced, we encourage and urge Commissioner Block to immediately resign his position as soon as possible,” reads the statement.

On a blogger conference call this afternoon, Sen. Arlen Specter (D-Pa.) announced he can’t support a potential addition of U.S. troops in Afghanistan. We ought

It’s not a whip count or anything like that, but as Secretary of State Hillary Rodham Clinton prepares to push for Senate ratification of the New START nuclear

Taking a quick cue from Massachusetts, the Obama administration is putting on its populist hat this week to take on the nation’s largest financial institutions

That’s the warning coming from the Australian government. In a report released Wednesday, the Great Barrier Reef Marine Park Authority found that the chances of

On the Fence Likely Supporters Likely Opponents 17 38 45 Likely Opponents Senator Stance on Public Option Stance

Sen. John McCain (R-Ariz.) who highlighted his support for cap-and-trade legislation to woo independent and environmentally-minded voters during the 2008